In The End
by WhiteJericho
Summary: Two years after it all ended, and here she was, holding a bouquet of yellow daisies and hoping that...well, that maybe mistakes could be made right, after all. Spoilers for the end of the manga.


AN: I haven't actually read the end of the manga, just spoilers and a blurry scan of the last page. This is just how I envisioned these two wonderful characters meeting again, after two years apart.

_In the End_

She'd been back in Japan for three days before she could find the courage to go and see him. The hospital's sterile hugeness unnerved her in some unnamable way, and Hiyono found herself leafing through cards in the gift shop to delay the inevitable. Perhaps she should bring him something? It felt uncomfortably like a peace offering, but surely it couldn't hurt. She settled at last on a bouquet of flowers—not irises, she couldn't take that; no, she chose a spray of cheerful yellow daisies, something the old Hiyono would have liked.

All the way up the elevator ride to the long-term patient ward, she twisted the cellophane wrapping and hoped beyond hope for something like a reunion of friends. Two years…forty-eight months losing herself in Germany, and knowing all that time that she'd find herself back here someday. The elevator door opened to another neutral hallway and the distant plinking sound of a piano. She followed the sound to a door near the end of the hall and stood listening. The music stopped. Taking a deep breath, Hiyono gathered her courage and opened the door.

He was there, sitting in a wide hospital bed next to a piano, bent over a sheaf of sheet music. He didn't look up as the door opened; he was too engrossed in the careful notations he was making on the sheet before him. Hiyono couldn't help but notice the way his left arm hung rigidly at his side as he wrote. Stirring herself, she closed the door with a quiet click.

"Hello, Ayumu. It's been a long time," she said softly.

Ayumu tensed slightly, stopping for just a moment before he resumed scribbling. "Hiyono." He didn't look at her.

She took his acknowledgment as permission to come closer to his bedside. "I brought you flowers," she held out the bouquet like an offering. "I wanted…to see how you were doing."

For a long moment, Ayumu didn't respond, and the only sound between them was the meditative scratching of his pen. Then, with a deep sigh, he set the pen down and looked up. "I'm still here, am I not?" he asked, meeting Hiyono's eyes. His voice was deeper than she'd remembered, calmer somehow. She had to break eye contact first. Ayumu reoriented himself in bed, shifting stiffly to face her, and Hiyono felt a small pang at the effort such a simple movement cost him.

"I'm sorry," she hastily apologized, eyes darting everywhere to avoid him, to avoid looking at the paralyzed arm resting beside him, and that steady gaze.

She felt rather than saw him frown, eyebrows drawing down in that familiar Ayumu sulk, and she chanced a sideways glance in his direction. "Don't be," he growled, and something of the old Ayumu she'd known flickered in his expression. "I'm alive." His eyes softened a little as he studied her face. "How was Germany?" he asked.

Hiyono smiled weakly. "It was far," she admitted.

They hovered in awkward silence, neither knowing how to continue. Hiyono took the moment to really look him over. He'd changed in two years, beyond the crippled arm and leg. There was a relaxed easiness in his expression that she'd never seen in him before, at least while he was awake. His eyes were clear of the frustration he'd always seemed to carry with him, and in its absence there was acceptance. He looked older. More at peace. His right hand still rested on the little lap-table in front of him, and Hiyono's gaze slipped from the sheet music to the piano.

"You're still writing music?" It wasn't a question, but she didn't know how else to approach him. He narrowed his eyes in confusion before he realized what she was looking at. "Hm," he acknowledged.

"Would…would you play for me?" she blurted out the words. Ayumu turned away from her, towards the piano, and sat silent for a few seconds. Just as Hiyono began to think she should apologize, he turned back towards her with a smile. It was such a warm, open smile—something so completely un-Ayumu—that it took her breath away.

"Very well." And, setting his one good hand to the keys, Ayumu played. It was not as complicated as the sonatas she remembered him playing before, one-handed as it was, but there was something breathtakingly pure in its simplicity. His touch had only improved in the two years since she'd left him, and his fingers danced lightly over the keys. Without really thinking about it, Hiyono sat on the edge of Ayumu's bed and closed her eyes to listen. For the first time, she felt as though she was really hearing Ayumu play from his heart.

The tune changed then, shifting into something more familiar; her eyes flew open as she recognized the song. Ayumu was looking over his shoulder at her, a teasing grin on his face as he played a tinkling rendition of "Twinkle My Heart." He winked at her. "Remember this one? You used to drive me nuts singing it," he baited.

Hiyono swallowed a sudden lump in her throat and hummed the tune. To her surprise, he hummed along, still picking out the keys without looking. It was too much for her, finding her old friend so changed, so forgiving despite everything that she had done to him. Hiyono burst into tears and threw her arms around the shocked Ayumu's neck. She felt him put his right arm around her reflexively as she tucked her head into his shoulder.

"Hey!" he protested gently, but he let her lean against him until she regained her composure.

She pushed herself back finally and wiped her face against her sleeve. "I'm sorry," she whispered. Ayumu frowned, clearly wondering what he'd done wrong. "For being away so long," she explained.

Suddenly, Hiyono realized that her mad dive had knocked Ayumu's writing table askew. The neat stack of music was now strewn across the floor, out of Ayumu's reach. She slid off the bed and began to collect the scattered sheets of paper. When she turned around, Ayumu was staring at her, an unreadable expression on his face. His eyes didn't leave her as she shuffled the music she held and laid it back down on the table.

When their eyes met, she knew that she'd made her decision. "I won't leave again," she promised.

He looked at her for a long time…and he smiled, as broad and sweet a smile as she'd ever seen on his face. "Welcome back."


End file.
